This invention pertains to bottom feed conveyors wherein stock intems, such as sheets of paper or envelopes and the like are arranged in a stack and the items are peeled off from the bottom of the stack. The only way heretofore to feed from the bottom of a stack was to lay the items imbricately on a long conveyor and arrange the items that only a very small number were piled one upon the other at the metering mechanism. Otherwise any attempts to increase the height of the pile at the metering mechanism resulted either in misfeeds or double or multiple feeds. Thus the conveyor had to be extensive and required various controls to insure proper feed rate so that the items would not bunch up at the metering mechanism. Ordinarily an operator was required to constantly shift and arrange the items so that they progressed in a uniform shingle-like arrangement toward the metering device.